my microcosm

Please Don't Feed the Bears: A Vegan Cookbook

In the vein of the classic Soy Not Oi cookbook, Please Don’t Feed The Bears compiles three issues of the previously self-published vegan cook zine with a range of tasty and simple animal-free dishes. The collection finally makes available these long-obscure fanzines originally published in the mid 1990s. In here you’ll find incredible recipes for stews, soups, sauces, noodle & bean dishes, baked entrees, deserts and more! There is also a fair smattering of new material bringing this to a whopping 160 pages of deliciousness! These recipes are written to be simple, straightforward, and perfect for the newest convert to the vegan revolution!
But far from bring just a vegan cookbook, Please Don’t Feed The Bears reads as a look into vegan lifestyle and underground culture. Thoroughly illustrated with eye-catching drawings and clearly laid-out graphics, the book also includes assorted rantings about music and the politics of leading a vegan lifestyle. Together the book provides easy-to-make and delectable recipes while reflecting the DIY punk rock sensibility of zine culture.

Comments

AbbieCarfax2/24/2012

This book is fantastic. Hongshao Doufu is the best tofu I've ever made. Chili of Holy Terror is the best chili I've ever made. It is super hot and tasty, and comes with advice like don't put mushrooms in the author's chili or he will punch you.

expiredsanity8/22/2011

This is my new favourite cookbook. Everything I've made from it has turned out amazing and the recipes are so cheap that it has easily saved me more then the cost of the book. If you only have one cookbook in your house, it better be this one.

Maria, Goodreads5/16/2011

"I liked this book. There are a lot of recipes!!! Most of them seem great. the only thing I don't like is the amount of fake meats that appear in this book. I don't like the texture, it's too similar to real meat. The one thing that made this book stand out from most other vegan cook books was the stories and other fun stuff on every page."

"Best collected vegan recipes. And, as an added bonus, the best black metal cooking soundtrack you can find, an interview with Carcass, amusing illustrations and anecdotes, and how to make your own tattoo machine. What more do you want?"

Indie Street2/20/2010

"From the first page of this cookbook, I could tell Abjorn Intonsus and I would get along well: Everything in this cookbook is anti-copyrighted. For, even though our choices in how we eat and consume music clearly differ, I believe our values align in more than one other way. All the same, I was ready to learn. And learn I did. Extensive notes on ingredients and preparation methods adorn the book, which, for a kitchen clod like me, work out very nicely. From soups & sauces, to how not to handle a habanero pepper, to main dishes that I’m going to begin incorporating into my extremely thin selection, nearly every instruction is easy and appealing to “cooks” of any skill level. I’ll be making a lot of peanut butter sauces for myself in the coming days, as well as adding tofu to my dishes more confidently. It’s times like these when I am glad that I have culinarily-inclined housemates and inspiring books like this to help me kick the Ramen diet. I truly am excited to claim this as my first useful cookbook."

anthropophagus9/11/2009

Bought this for my boyfiend for christmas a few years ago and this is solidly, one of the best cookbooks ever. None of the recipes we've made turned out poorly, and the book also has lots of little stories as well as awesome drawings, some of which have even made it into our tattoos (with the homemade machine how-to in the back!)

Worth the buy.

e11/24/2007

Terror of the Thai Soup = Best vegan Thai soup ever!

Maygun w/Profane Existence Magazine7/19/2007

I can't believe it. I'm holding in my own two li'l hands a bound copy of the three issues of the long since out of print zine Please Don't Feed the Bears written in the 90s . I still have my dog-eared, food-covered copies on my shelf, but I'm a packrat. I can't tell ya what a great joy it is to see this in print again, and in book format! For those of you that didn't get to read them the first time around, get ready for an (animal-free) treat! PDFTB reads like the little spitfire brother of Soy not Oi!, where vegan recipes are listed with punk rock song tracks for what to listen to while cooking. The recipes are great for the new vegetarian who is looking for a wide variety of straightforward tasty recipes. The book combines recipes from all the original zines, divided into courses. The recipes are easy to follow, fun to read, international in variety, and taste great! These zines and Soy not Oi! were the ones I referred to most when learning how to cook vegan food. Buy this. For the sentiment if you used to read the zines. For the quality if you never got the chance to. You want this on your shelf. Excellent. Kudos to Microcosm for putting this out.

410 Media3/10/2007

148 pages of Vegan recipes and a few odd pages at the back for a homemade teeth whitener and tattoo guns. A unique collection of vegan recipes that are all accompanied by a metal song to play while you are making it because nothing is better than making meat free dishes while hearing a guy growling like a bear. Maybe that is where the title comes from.
This, I believe compiles three issues of a vegan cooking zine. It is a unique cookbook full of great recipes and occasional quotes from people as diverse as Samuel Longhorne Clemens and David from Morbid Angel. It makes for a cookbook that you can actually sit down and read. I made a couple of recipes Prairie Fire Reddened Rice, I didn't have the Liturgy - Dawn of Ash lp, so I substituted for a Hellhammer LP I bought in the 80s and it was tasted. The next recipe I searched for by song rather than by recipe. I knew I had an old Slayer lp, so I made the Slaytanic Scrambler. Again, tasty stuff. I am not a vegan, I love chicken wings too much, but I am not the carnivore that must have meat at every meal, so I intend to reference this cookbook from time to time. I would think it would be a must have for a vegan metal fan.

Ajuni12/22/2006

my best friend bought me this vegan cookbook during our early christmas exchange before she abandoned me for a week to Hawaii..and I must admit, as a cookbook, it has kept my mind plenty busy. Not only does it have elaborate amaaaaaazinngg recipes, but it even has a DIY tatoo machine. I'm not going to lie, I've already bought all the parts to make one. Anyway, buy it and love it! (beware to take all of the vulgar pictures as nothing offensive)

Isaac Pirie, Maximum Rock and Roll #287

The book is filled with recipes that, as the author writes in the introduction, are of a pretty basic variety. Everything in the book is pretty easy to make and the ingredients are probably available to most vegans at a fairly inexpensive price. The few we tried were really good. The author is clearly into what he is doing and in terms of a cookbook I think that counts for something. If you're interested in a book of easy to make recipes for when you're tired and just came home from work this is a worthwhile compilation.

Brian Redbeard, Give Me Back #51

What can say beyond this: any cookbook which features great recipes, an interview with Carcass, direction on making a tattoo machine, and recipes for D.I.Y. Ny-quil, wheat paste, and watermelon slushes is a-fucking-o.k. by me. There really is no genre to the book. This is the vegan-punk-rock equivalent to the Betty Crocker tome my mother used on a regular basis. Make sure you try the "Szechuan Tofu Triangles in Triple-Threat Pepper sauce" and don't forget to listen to Killing Addiction's Legacies of Terror demo.

Ryan Canavan, Hanging like a Hex

This is easily the most entertaining cookbook I’ve ever come across. From all accounts it’s a total homage to Soy Not Oi, but since I never saw that this takes the number one spot. It also has some damn good recipes from an author completely obsessed with incredibly obscure metal and thrash. Each recipe is accompanied by music to listen to, most of which I’d never heard of (anyone else have the Thergothon, “Fhatgn Nagh Yog-Sothoth” demo from 1991?). Most of these recipes have awesome names, many of which I’ve made based on the name alone. I mean, wouldn’t you be into eating a meal called Taco Thrasherole? Or maybe the Warzone Calzone? Or maybe Extreme Noise Teriyaki Kabobs? I know I would! There’s also funny sketches in many of these pages, often plays on metal logos and so forth, some quotes here and there from different authors and musicians, and probably the most obscure crossword puzzle ever called Metal Is the Law. The whole thing runs the gamut from sauces and dips, to main courses, deserts, medicines, sides, and so forth... many of them being in the more adventurous/ spicy/ multi-ethnic side of cooking. It’s really freakin’ great and I’ve already gotten quite a bit of use out of this. Oh yeah, did I mention all these recipes are vegan? Yeah, how about that suckas!

Xerography Debt #21

I can easily see this becoming a classic on the shelf.

Tristan Clark, Aduki Magazine

The spiked, leather-clad, hairy-chested domain of heavy metal has with few exceptions (notably the bands Carcass, Cattle Decapitation and Animals Killing People and members of Metallica, Napalm Death and Poison) remained anathema to issues of animal welfare and ethical dietary choice. The concept of a vegan metalhead compiling a cookbook is therefore an obviously appealing proposition. Please Don’t Feed the Bears offers some 150-pages of the author’s (and friends’) favourite recipes with an overt metal theme. The book is essentially an expansion of a zine format presented in a stark, black-and-white style accompanied by illustrations and quotes. Most impressively each recipe has a recommended album to serve as soundtrack for the meal’s preparation. And no you won’t find no “Savory Truffle” (The Beatles), “Fish, Chips and Sweat” (Funkadelic) or “Roast Fish and Cornbread” (Lee Perry) here, just a plethora of death, black, thrash, grind, and doom metal. The recipes tend to retain a simplicity that will appeal to those with limited kitchen competence though still maintaining appeal for the more experienced. Whilst the nutritional value of many of the meals could be questioned with a heavy use of oils, sweeteners, soy and wheat, how can one really resist such dishes as ‘The Chilli of Holy Terror,’ ‘Taco Trash-erole’ and ‘Crunchy Sugar Choco-tomic Bomb Pie’? Metal Up Your Ass!

Olivia Lane, SuperVegan.com

Please Don't Feed the Bears is the latest vegan cookbook released by the wonderful folks at Microcosm Publishing. The book compiles some of editor Abjorn Intonsus' favorite recipes in a punky, zine-like format that is wonderfully unique.

Intonsus treats us to kick-ass recipes for a worldly selection of good foods rarely seen together in a single cookbook. Within the 160 pages, you'll find fairly simple recipes for dishes with fun names like Dehumanization Roast, Big Bear Berbere, Road Rash Skillet, Killer Kofta Balls, Viva Zapata Chalupas, and Warzone Calzone. Each recipe comes with a suggested esoteric song to play while cooking, but the chances that you have this music are a million to one.

I tried the Cop-Shop Special and they were the 2nd best donuts I've had since becoming vegan. Vegan Treats donuts are best, but these certainly weren't bad for an amateur venture. Perhaps they would have been better had I played Blessed Death instead of substituting with Operation Ivy.

What I enjoy most about Please Don't is its brilliant randomness. Humorous drawings of bears and other wildlife dot the pages. There's a "Heavy Metal is the Law" crossword puzzle to keep you busy as you wait for your dough to rise. And finally, there's the tattoo gun recipe, which is just priceless.

If you've got enough page flags to tame this wild, unindexed book and are looking to explore the joys of punk vegan cooking, then Please Don't Feed the Bears is the cookbook for you!

Riot 77 Magazine

[T]his book is well put together, cleverly researched and clearly written by someone who views veganism as a way of life.

Profane Existence, #54

PDFTB reads like a spitfire little brother of Soy Not Oi!, where vegan recipes are listed with punk rock song tracks for what to listen to while cooking. The recipes are great for the new vegetarian who is looking for a wide variety of straightforward tasty recipes. The book combines recipes from all the original zines, divided into courses. The recipes are easy to follow, fun to read, international in variety, and taste great! ... Buy this ... Excellent. Kudos to Microcosm for putting this out.